FIGHT CASES BASED ON MERIT, NOT JUST TO ATTACK JUDICIARY, SAYS FORMER CJ

BANGI, Feb 3 (Bernama) - Former Chief Justice Tun (Dr) Abdul Hamid Mohamad

today said that court cases should be fought on merit, not just to attack judges

or the judiciary.

Alluding to a recent case involving an opposition politician where the trial

took 88 working days over aperiod of two years and 10 months, he said the

proceedings saw attempts to discredit the judiciary and to question the

independence of thejudiciary.

During the same period, he said a case involving a former Menteri Besar who

was charged for corruption took only 19 working days over a period of one year

and went on smoothly without much fanfare.

And when the person was convicted, he did not even criticise the judge nor

judiciary, he said.

Similarly, cases involving several personalities including Datuk Haji Harun

Haji Idris, Haji Abdul Ghani Isha, Datuk Haji Zulkifli Datuk Abdul Hamid and

Datuk Mokhtar Hashim were all fought on merit, and did not have elements of

judges and the judiciary being attacked, he said at the inaugural Integrity

Lecture Series - "Integrity: You Know It But Do You Have It?" at Universiti

Tenaga Nasional (Uniten) here today.

Abdul Hamid, who is also a member of the Judicial Appointments Commission,

said the integrity of the judiciary in the country had improved significantly in

the last four years.

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ABDUL HAMID-MERIT 2 BANGI

He said efforts were being made to restore the integrity of the judiciary,

which dropped to its lowest ebb following the celebrated case involving a lawyer

and his taped telephone conversation about a judge.

In addition, he said, the courts had also succeeded in reducing backlogged

cases and the period taken for the disposal of cases to such an extent that even

the World Bank had given a favourable report on the matter.

Abdul Hamid, who is also the former Chairman of the Advisory Council of the

Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC), said political leaders, top-level

administrators and corporate leaders must be serious about combating corruption

and must lead by example.

"People tend to focus only on the public sector while the private sector

escapes attention.

"Government or public servants, judges and others must be clean while

companies and businessmen need not be clean as they are only to be judged by how

much profit they make. That kind of culture has to be changed," he said.

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ABDUL HAMID-MERIT 3 (LAST) BANGI

Abdul Hamid said politicians, whether they were running the government or in

the opposition, should not adopt an attitude that they could be an exception.

"In the fight against corruption, no one is special and be an exception, he

stressed.

-- BERNAMA

KHL SHY HA